Scientology on Scientology: A Religion Talking to Itself

On an almost daily basis I hop on my computer, open Internet Explorer, head to Google, proceed to type in scientology, and click News. In typical Google style I'm whisked to a page containing the most recent news reports on the cult of scientology before I can even blink.

Each day we have the usual; the always stellar Tony Ortega's VillageVoice blog Runnin' Scared, a local paper like the St. Pete Times, or the Houston Chronicle should have some dirt on the Debbie Cook situation, and the odd time an unenlightened small town local paper will praise the cult for setting up a new church in their hood, not aware of the dangers that lurk beneath the gold plated facade.

Recently though I have noticed many scientology articles being written in support of the cult. They solicit things like the wondrous program from Narconon, or sing praise to a long deceased, never-to-return L. Ron Hubbard in the form of Happy Birthday. I must admit, I was not aware of DigitalJournal at the time. This left me quite perplexed, and grasping for a quick answer because my hangover from the previous nights birthday celebration was making each thought more and more painful. After 30-seconds of pure torture I shut down the computer and proceeded to lapse into an additional 8-hour coma.

I awoke almost as though I had an epiphany, and though the pain in my head was still slightly irritating, I had discovered the answer. L. Ron Hubbard had liaised with the intergalactic overlord Xenu and they had created the DigitalJournal to bring positivity to an otherwise dreary and drab state of affairs for scientology. However brilliant the possibility, I was quick to realize it was untrue. This was real life and not an episode of South Park (of which I am a HUGE fan, Trey, Matt, you dudes are the shhhhhhh). Who ever would have thought that two Jews could be so funny???

Moving forward. After determining that the Xenu situation could only exist in the realm of cartoon, I quickly moved back upstairs to sleep off the remainder of my splitting headache. I awoke early - considering I had slept for 36-hours - feeling refreshed and much less depressed. I followed my usual routine, Google- s-c-i-e-n-t-o-l-o-g-y -News, and up popped an article from DigitalJournal. What it said is irrelevant, the fact that it was positive made it suspicious. I clicked on the link, read the story, then scrolled to the top of the page to begin arbitrarily clicking on links. This is how I found out that DigitalJournal is a collection of contributions from reporters and writers all over the world. That's when it hit me, this was Scientology on scientology. Not like Freedom Magazine, or some other cult produced media. This was the cult using a public news site to write about themselves. What makes it even better is that their promotions are complete fabrications, wait... that's not so surprising.

That's like Paris Hilton (douche bag by the way) writing an article about herself saying, "Like yeah I'm going out tonight, I'm going to see Nicole, and I won't be drinking and driving." Nobody cares, and it's all bullsh...

Here is the really great part. The headlines from searching "scientology" on google news are as follows:

"Scientologist-run Rehab Centre Ordered Closed in Quebec" - CBC.ca

"Paul Thomas Anderson Film may be about scientology" - New York Times

"Mom slams drug rehab centre run by scientologists" - CBC.ca

"Narconon Arrowhead takes in Stranded" - Wire Service Canada

"One Year ago Today: Did the Squirrel Busters Mark the Beginning of the End of scientology" - VillageVoice

"Scientology's 'heretic': How Marty Rathbun became the arch-enemy of L. Ron Hubbard Devotees" - The Independent

That's a lot of negative press in the span of less than one-month. Now, here's the kicker, in among all this negative publicity, we have the following articles from DigitalJournal, George Randolph Hearst, III's the Albany Times Union, and CisionWire:

"Church of scientology hosts finale of International Human Rights World Tour" - DigitalJournal (Youth for Human Rights International is Scientology organization, of course they're hosting the finale, they were the only ones on the "tour"!)

"Meet a scientologist-George Seidler, There Since the Dawn of Dianetics" - CisionWire

These are articles written by scientology, on scientology, for scientology! In life people tend to remember the bad, not the good. Infiltrating the IRS-bad, infiltrating the Canadian Government-bad, Lisa McPherson-bad, Narconon-bad. This cult, like all cults, prey on the weak and impressionable. If Narconon was a legitimate, scientifically proven method of drug rehabilitation, then I'm all for it, but that's not the case. They have no idea what they're doing, no medical credentials, and it's a recruitment center on top of that.

Same with the Volunteer Ministers in Africa. What are the chances that these tribal leaders are well versed in the antics of scientology? I realize assumption is dangerous, but I'm going to assume that they know very little. scientololgy is using them as a vehicle to expand into an area where they aren't yet compromised.

Most of us aren't well versed in the criminal and controversial side of scientology. You know scientology through the love affair between Tom Cruise and Oprah's couch, or Tom's landmark interview with Matt Lauer (the $25M man by the way). Most of don't even know, let alone even met a scientologist. But we're all equal, we are are all brothers and sisters and we are here to respect and protect each other.

We have eyes, so read. We have brains, so think. We have ears, so listen. We have hands, so reach out. We have voices, so speak. Every day that this cult operates, is one day closer to a tragedy befalling one of our brothers or sisters. We have the tools to stop them and together we can!